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High School Football Brain Injuries

Here a new research finding from Purdue

WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind. - A study by researchers at Purdue University suggests that some high school football players suffer undiagnosed changes in brain function and continue playing even though they are impaired.

"Our key finding is a previously undiscovered category of cognitive impairment," said Thomas Talavage, an expert in functional neuroimaging who is an associate professor of biomedical engineering and electrical and computer engineering and co-director of the Purdue MRI Facility.
The findings represent a dilemma because they suggest athletes may suffer a form of injury that is difficult to diagnose.

The research team identified 11 players who either were diagnosed by a physician as having a concussion, received an unusually high number of impacts to the head or received an unusually hard impact. Of those 11 players, three were diagnosed with concussions during the course of the season, four showed no changes and four showed changes in brain function.

"So half of the players who appeared to be uninjured still showed changes in brain function," Leverenz said. "These four players showed significant brain deficits. Technically, we aren't calling the impairment concussions because that term implies very specific clinical symptoms, such as losing consciousness or having trouble walking and speaking. At the same time, our data clearly indicate significant impairment."

And I won't be here to see the dayIt all dries up and blows awayI'd hang around just to seeBut they never had much use for meIn Levelland. (James McMurtry)

Re: High School Football Brain Injuries

Football has always projected itself as the "manliest" of sports, the toughest, the most dangerous etc. Which leads to the ignorance when it comes to concussions because there is no visible blood, no visible bruising, no visible damage for the most part. The glory that is given to dangerous helmet to helmet hits is a disgusting spectacle to me at this point. Yes, you have to be tough to play football, but you also have to be tough to play every sport.

I can't tell you how many arguments I'd get into with football people in high school about soccer players being sissies, go youtube some of the videos of people getting their legs fractured in half from slide tackles before you speak.

The media takes a HUGE amount of blame for the rising epidemic of brain injuries among former football players. They need to take responsibility and stop glorifying dangerous hits that threaten people's lives and serve no purpose to the game itself.

Re: High School Football Brain Injuries

Aren't you both missing the point?

The point is that lots more kids are getting brain damage than previously thought. Up to now, they've tallied injuries according to the kids who had a diagnosed concussion. But this finding shows that many kids who never have a diagnosis are also brain damaged.

And I won't be here to see the dayIt all dries up and blows awayI'd hang around just to seeBut they never had much use for meIn Levelland. (James McMurtry)

Re: High School Football Brain Injuries

No, I understand your point Putnam, but I'm saying a lot of the reason things like this are misdiagnosed or overlooked is because of the macho, manly persona the NFL and the media has placed on the sport of football.

What injuries get the biggest, oooh we probably shouldn't show this moment? When someone's leg snaps in half or their knee bends in an awkward way, but if someone is lying motionless on the ground after a huge hit, the announcer barely even bat an eye, some announcers actually are still too busy guffawing over the big hit to realize the seriousness of the symptoms being presented.

Re: High School Football Brain Injuries

When someone's leg snaps in half or their knee bends in an awkward way, but if someone is lying motionless on the ground after a huge hit,

Yep. I still appreciate Pat Summerall or Merlin Olsen, I forget which, during the early moments of SuperBowl XXIII when Bengals linebacker Tim Krumrie was hurt. The cameras kept rolling back and forth across that gruesome leg break, and Olsen (or Summerall) stated quite pointedly, "We DON'T need to see that again!!"

And I won't be here to see the dayIt all dries up and blows awayI'd hang around just to seeBut they never had much use for meIn Levelland. (James McMurtry)

Re: High School Football Brain Injuries

Yep. I still appreciate Pat Summerall or Merlin Olsen, I forget which, during the early moments of SuperBowl XXIII when Bengals linebacker Tim Krumrie was hurt. The cameras kept rolling back and forth across that gruesome leg break, and Olsen (or Summerall) stated quite pointedly, "We DON'T need to see that again!!"

Enberg and Olsen were the broadcast duo for that game I do believe....

Nuntius was right. I was wrong. Frank Vogel has retained his job.

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"A player who makes a team great is more valuable than a great player. Losing yourself in the group, for the good of the group, that’s teamwork."